Air and Stars
by Lunamaria
Summary: Once upon a time, the magic is gone.


_Air and Stars_.

They all want the same thing.

There are days, locked behind the iron gates of Hollow Bastion, where even the fairest of them all loses hope. They are all locked in an alarming alive-dead deep sleep, while they rage on in hurtles within their hearts and subconscious. Yes, even the princesses' of heart have nightmares.

--

She dreams of frightening things from time to time, locked inside her own. She often dawns upon memories of the seven little men she holds so dearly in her heart, and the song that she sang over her wishing well. She believes that the well in which her dreams were granted is now very far away.

Snow White dreams of her prince as well.

Well, her _once upon a time _prince. Though, now, her dreams lead her to believe things that aren't true.

She wonders if her prince was never there and maybe she was just dreaming of an escape from her nightmare, locked inside the cage. Perhaps things like poisoned cherry apples, seven gesture personified little men, and a handsome loving prince never existed anyways.

How can she be sure?

Things, locked behind the force field of her mind, are ambiguous.

She is frightened. Even more than when she ran through the pulling limbs of the trees of the frightening forest, with the deathly expressions of the vultures looking down upon her, leading to the place where she happened upon those seven little men. But, then again, did that ever really happen anyway?

The memories that used to be so clear and vivid are now cracked and faded.

She is terribly unsure and frightened.

She's become frail and her skin looks like snow more than ever. Her heart hangs in the balance between dreams and nightmares, reality and make-believe.

The Fairest of Them All is terribly unsure of herself and her heart is slowly breaking, because maybe there was never really a prince or a family of little men who told her every day she was beautiful.

After all, it is the more beautiful things that break most easily.

--

She's terribly unsure of what's to come.

She's afraid to be alone again. No Prince, no mice, no birds, and no friends. There is just the old gate that imprisons her and a heart that aches.

Things like wealth and riches never meant a thing to Cinderella.

It was treasures like friends and her loyal prince that kept her truly alive. Now where is she?

In the faded corridors of her mind, there are no songs that give hope to dream another day. She is awfully terrified of being alone. A voice deep within herself, that makes her a princess of heart, screams,

'Please don't leave me here all alone'.

Please, no.

Cinderella lets her voice cry out.

Midnight seems to hold a special place in her mind, and each day the hazy image of a glass slipper gives her heart just a little bit more hope. She doesn't know why her heart longs so greatly for the beautiful shoe. It's all fuzzy and hard to read.

Then, when she seems to be winning that unconquerable battle within herself, she catches a glimpse of dark chocolate hair. Then the faint tune of a song with partial lyrics like 'a dream is a wish your heart makes' and 'your dream that you wish will come true' suddenly stops. She wants that fragmented stranger to hold her close, to embrace her like he does in her dreams, her illusions maybe.

But, then the wind blows and sorrow dons, and she realizes he was only an angel of her memories.

When Cinderella dreams, is that really the wish her heart makes? She's awfully scared.

Her hope dies just a little bit more.

Her glass slipper looks more like plastic every day.

--

Sleeping in an ethereal trance is nothing particularly new to her. But, somehow, things are much more different and pressuring than before. Now, she's locked within a living nightmare, where things like magic and promise won't save her.

It's inevitable and futile, anyhow.

The land in which is her dreamscape is pure and untouched by anyone, but behind facades lay fleeting memories of the times that the nightmares don't want her to remember.

It reminds Aurora of her (un)memories from what seem like years ago.

She's stricken with visions of dragons and of little fairy wings. She can remember three such figures: one plump and blue, one green and skinny, and one pink and just right. However, the only name she can recover is 'Flora' from the three- the rest is invalid- and it hurts deep within.

She's terrified of change. The magic is gone.

Her 'memories' seldom come upon on her, and she is thrust unwilling into the thing she is most afraid of,

Change.

Her subliminal world is swiftly shifting into change as Aurora leaves behind her Prince ('Phillip' She barely recalls) and the three little fairies that were never really there or existed anyhow.

Once upon a time, Aurora is a sleeping beauty again.

--

It's cold and that's something she may never grow accustom to.

Unlike the times she spent in the warm, blazing star of Agrabah. There, the sun is magnificent and unyielding. Now, she is frozen and frightened by the shadows that block out the aforementioned wondrous star.

She's just unsure whether her 'home' will be there when she wakes up or not.

Was it even real?

She often thinks about her 'life' in Agrabah and if that boy with unruly hair and an adventurous persona will rescue her. Please, Rescue me, Jasmine pleads from within her nightmares. Interlocked with confusion, the young Arabian princess struggles for the truth.

A princess? Is she really one, Jasmine wonders? Or is it just another figment?

It's awfully cold and lonely when one is alone.

There are some days, if one can recollect days in such a state, when she loses hope. Then there are others when she gains an upper hand by recovering a memory of something she lost.

Back on that time she went up against Jafar, with her dear love Aladdin, she was nowhere near as afraid as she is now.

Back on Genie and her father and Aladdin and on others, she thinks of love.

But, perchance those are someone else's memories. She may never know. Everything in this state is delicate like glitter, and the most important things are fleeting memories of the past.

She misses her star and the boy who 'supposedly' taught her to love and loved her for herself, and not her riches.

But, she smiles, because deep in her heart, she can feel it warm up when she dreams of that boy.

But, then again, as most things do,

Jasmine's precious things become unrecognizable.

There's an eclipse today, it seems.

--

She's just a child.

She's trapped in a place accumulated of much more nonsense and tomfoolery than all the profound lunacy snuggled tightly into Wonderland. The deep reaches of both her mind and heart taunt her with ridiculous illusions that never were and will never be.

Shadows haunt her and there is no order in the horrors that plague the young girl with ease.

She needs a savior. The purity she found in life, and in dreams is far beyond her reach.

But, Alice knows her 'memories' or rather her 'dreams' were false anyhow. They are just painful reminders of things that she'll never have. Even though she's only a child, she is sensible and knows she won't be fooled by the illusions the nightmares cast on her.

Afternoons sipping tea and reading literatures with an auburn tabby cat are only faint yesterdays her imagination conjures.

She can hear that rabbit now, scurrying ahead in worry, crying,

"I'm late, I'm late, I'm late! Not time to say 'Hello', _goodbye_, I'm late, I'm late, I'm late!"

But, he wasn't even a real rabbit anyhow.

Even so, she's only a little girl. But, these nightmares have surfaced the sense in her, and she passed childhood all to quickly.

She's been forced to grow up too fast.

Wonderland, that place she never believes she visited with moronic twins and a despicable queen and an illusive blanche rabbit, will never earn a place in her memory.

After all, with the nightmares and the truth and the false hanging in a thin balance,

She's lost hope, along with her childhood, long ago.

The dreamy hare was right, she realizes, for childhood, she is late.

There _is_ no time to say 'hello', _goodbye_, she's late, she's late,

_She's late_.

--

She's an intelligent woman, with pristine to match.

Far off, whimsical fairytales of love and laughter fueled her passion for life and her imagination grew boundless. However, not even she could imagine such a horrible stretch of emptiness. Belle was an upright, sensible, but still childish woman. She, beyond the doubt of an entire French village and Gaston, had an opinion and mind of her own still.

Her opinions grew silent into whimpers of fear.

Her promise though - that never would her fear scale farther than almost losing Beast – lives on. She can still hear broken echoes, bouncing of the steel imprisoning walls, calling her name softly.

"_Belle_", it calls. Then, like all things here do, it fades into nothing.

Still, she has an upright and prideful spirit that most girls are left without. She does her best not to cry out in fear or to dream of the day a prince will come to rescue her- not saying her love for her prince strays- but doing so, she feels, will mean defeat.

She can feel what the other captive girls feel. She can feel the pain and loneliness in knowing that you're helpless, that maybe her adventures in far off lands will be always to an end. She, compared to most of the others, has the best sense of 'alive' in the alive-dead.

She can freely think. She thanks herself for having such an open mind.

She's never missed them so much. Mrs. Potts, Chip, Lumiere, everyone else and - above all - Beast.

'It's the most beautiful things that break the easiest' Belle freely muses.

She can keep the most hope, despite horrifying visions and dreams of death and forever sleep, restraining her from things like princes and dreams.

She's quite the dreamer, you know.

Her books are also nowhere to be found. It's painful, her mind and imagination falling to the dust everyday. She's very afraid of losing her books, her friends.

But, she thinks, reminiscing on one of her favorite tales.

_Beauty and the Beast_, she recalls its name.

"True love" a smile "Conquers all."

But still…

For the time being it will only be "And the Beast" because, at the moment,

"Beauty" is yearning for her freedom.

--

She's different from all of them, she knows.

She isn't a princess of a little girl who grew up to fast. She is caught between adolescence and adulthood, with the hopeful mentality of a little girl.

She doesn't dream of going back to her lavished castle with a charming and handsome prince. No, her tiny island with a clumsy boy who wields a big key is perfectly fine with her. Everyone one of the girls locked here is afraid of something, Kairi thinks, wondering about her own fear.

But, she knows what it is.

The tight walls are suffocating her, pulling her into the fearful and despicable shadows. Is it the shadows she was afraid of? Of course, but no, she was afraid of many other things as well.

Faded memories, loneliness, the cold, change, growing up, and loss of her freedom.

So she, in her own terrifying way, is every one of the princess' of heart – only in one person.

She even has her own prince . . .

The girl, oh yes that plain girl from the island with the biggest heart is terribly afraid.

Still, she'll wait patiently, and for forever it seems.

A forever where magic and midnights and dreams exist, but as most beautiful things do, they are like feathers flown away. Just like Air and Stars.

They meet in a place where only such things as air and stars, where such tragic fleeting things gather – to a land pure and unknown.

The girl quite not a child and quite not an adult, with the largest hope imaginable, begins to see a light.

A beautiful, angelic light, with a key shining through . . .

--

"Kairi, Kairi C'mon, wake up!"

She's won't awaken.

"Kairi, you lazy bum."

--

That dream again – the dream they all dream.

Yes, even when the princesses' of heart have nightmares, they have dreams as well.

- -- - -

Ah, to make this quick, I worked on this for a while.  
No, what I mean is I forgot about it  
and just no restarted it.

What can I say?

Well, this is for Mio's Tragic fairytale challenge.  
I hope I incorporated my theme well enough for you.

I used bits of "Air and Stars" by Maaya Sakamoto for this.

It is based on all of the Princesses' of Heart.  
I meant for each of them to be afraid of one thing,  
Snow White, in losing her memories.  
Cinderella, losing her dear loves ones, loneliness.  
Jasmine, the cold and darkness.  
Aurora, of change and going back in her deep-sleep.  
Not really anything for Alice, rather that she just grew up to fast.  
Belle, of losing her freedom and dreams.  
Kairi, basically all of the above, save Alice.

BTW. Belle was my favorite to write, because  
she is my most treasured Disney princess.

OH and I really wanted to call Beast by his human  
name "Adam", but it would've thrown people off, so -

For Caitlan, a late birthday present.  
I wanted to make you a Kaixel, and I will someday soon.  
I promise, but until then . . .

Also, thank you felia for beta-ing the first parts.

That's all, thanks.

Read & review. Kthx.

Bai!

disclaimer; standard disclaimer applies.

¤ _composed by lunamaria_.


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